Jennifer Parker
Jennifer Jane Parker McFly was the girlfriend, and later the wife, of Marty McFly. Jennifer was the world's fourth time traveler and the third human one. She was the daughter of Danny Parker Jr. and Betty Parker, and the granddaughter of Danny Parker and his wife Betty Lapinski. Jennifer and Marty seemed to be "serious" enough for him to introduce her to his best friend, local inventor Dr. Emmett Brown, whom she first regarded as eccentric and strange. Jennifer is mostly a positive person, knowing what to say to Marty if he needed cheering up, and wondering what happy life she might have in the future. Biography Early life Jennifer was born in 1967 in Hill Valley, California. She was Marty's girlfriend, having met him at Hill Valley High School, which they both attended in 1985. Sometime before 1985, Jennifer met Marty and started dating him, eventually falling passionately in love with him. She also became friends with Doc. 1985 On October 25, 1985, Marty arrived late for school again. As he got to the school entrance, Jennifer met him there and warned him not to enter that way as Mr. Strickland was looking for him. Jennifer managed to find another way for them to get into school unseen, but just when the coast seemed clear, Strickland caught the two of them. She received a tardy slip from Strickland, but her disciplinary record had not yet caught up to Marty's infamous "four tardies in a row." She then had to watch as Strickland insulted Marty and his family. After school, Jennifer accompanied Marty to the Battle of the Bands audition to help him set up and provide moral support Unfortunately, the Pinheads were rejected for being "too darn loud", devastating Marty. Afterwards, they went outside, and Jennifer comforted Marty by reminding him that one rejection is not the end of the world and assures him that he is a good musician. She then suggested that he send in a demo tape cassette of his band's music to a record company called R & G Records, pointing out that if he puts his mind on it, he can accomplish anything, which is a saying of Doc's. However, Marty doubted that he could take another rejection. Jennifer and Marty also talked about their plans to have a romantic weekend together at the lake and how Marty's father George was letting them use their car. Marty then spotted a Toyota Hilux 4X4 that he wants and flirted with Jennifer by wrapping his arm around her waist. Jennifer then asked if Marty's mother Lorraine was aware of their weekend plans, and Marty told her that Lorraine thought that he was going camping with his friends. Jennifer disapproved of him lying to her and flirtatiously noted that Lorraine is just trying to keep Marty "respectable." The two then started kissing in Courthouse Square, but were interrupted by the Clock Tower Lady. After Marty gave the lady a quarter and she left, Marty and Jennifer started kissing again, but is then interrupted by her father who was coming to pick her up in his car. As Jennifer prepared to leave, Marty promised to call her later that night. Jennifer told him that she would be at her grandma's house that evening, so she wrote down her grandma's telephone number, 555-4823, along with I love you!, on the back of a Xeroxed Clock Tower flyer (because of this, Marty had the flyer in his pocket, and still had it in his possession after he got stuck in 1955). She then kissed him goodbye. Jennifer later called Marty twice that night, but she ends up having to speak instead to Marty's sister Linda, who made it clear to Marty that she was not his "answering service". This evoked a harsh response from the Lorraine of the original timeline, who disapproved of the Sadie Hawkins method and said that she does not like girls who call up boys. 1985B Marty woke up on the morning of October 26, 1985 in the second timeline. Linda let him know that Jennifer had called him earlier in the morning. Thanks to the changes that he made in the past, Marty learned, to his surprise, that Lorraine always approved of Marty dating Jennifer. He also found out that Lorraine both knows about and approved of him going camping with Jennifer at the lake for a romantic weekend ever since Marty made the plans two weeks earlier. Additionally, Marty now has a Toyota Hilux truck that he can use to drive him and Jennifer to the lake. As Marty admired his truck, an amorous Jennifer arrives and flirtatiously asked him, "How about a ride, Mister?" Marty greeted her enthusiastically, startling Jennifer, who was unaware that Marty has spent a week in 1955 since she had last seen him the day before. Ironically, a worried Jennifer noted, "Marty, you're acting like you haven't seen me in a week," to which he replied, "I haven't." A concerned Jennifer caressed Marty and asked him if everything was all right. Marty assured her that "everything is great." Jennifer smiled, and the two embraced and started kissing passionately. However, they were interrupted when Doc crashed into Marty's yard in his DeLorean time machine. Doc told Marty and Jennifer that they need to go "back to the future" with him as they saw him refuel the DeLorean with Marty's garbage. Doc warned Jennifer and Marty that their future children's lives are in danger. Shocked by everything that she was witnessing, Jennifer remained dumbstruck for the duration of Doc's arrival. As a result, Marty was able to take advantage of her confusion to get her to come into the DeLorean with him and sit on his lap without a struggle or having to answer any questions. Jennifer soon found that the DeLorean was flying. 1986F Although it is not specifically mentioned, it is likely that neither Jennifer nor her father were ever born in an alternate 1986 in which Irving "Kid" Tannen never went to prison and the Tannen Crime Family ultimately became the fifth most powerful crime family in California. This is due to the fact that Jennifer's paternal grandmother Betty left her grandfather Danny in 1931, before they were to have been married, after his failure to capture "Carl Sagan", which he blamed on "flying space cars". 1986G .]] The Jennifer in this timeline was a punk girl that regularly broke the rules. Sometime prior to the events of Marty interacting with this timeline she dumped an alternate version of him because he wasn't good at playing guitar and followed the rules, making him a "square". She then started to date Leech, who was possibly an alternate Needles. She fell back to Marty after he bested Leech in guitar skills. After Marty was captured by Edna Strickland, he woke up in the Citizen Plus Program facility, discovering Jennifer in the room next door, already having undergone the first "treatment" and acting docile and slightly brainwashed. Marty used his guitar to break the brainwashing, and Jennifer helped him escape by knocking out the security guard, locking him in her soundproof room, and giving his uniform to Marty as a disguise. She gave Marty a good luck kiss as she left, and said "Bite me!" to the guard escorting her out when he threatened to write her up for a public display of affection. 2015 Jennifer joined Marty and Doc in the DeLorean. Upon entering 2015, Jennifer excitedly started asking Doc questions about her future. Not wanting her to know, Doc used a sleep-inducing alpha rhythm generator on her, sending her to sleep. He left her in an alleyway whilst Marty visited the Cafe 80's pretending to be his future son, and while Doc went to knock out the real Marty Jr. Police officers Reese and Foley found Jennifer in the alleyway, and used an identa-pad to find out who she was; and since her thumbprint never changed over the years, they assumed she was the 2015 Jennifer ("47? That's a hell of a good facelift!"). They took Jennifer in their police car to her future home in Hilldale and left her inside, just as she started to wake up. Jennifer realized she was trapped in her future home — she did not know how to open the thumb pad-operated doors — and found out what her future would be. She would hear Marty's parents relate how Marty had gotten himself into a car accident after a former classmate had called him a chicken, and how Marty's life had been ruined. Jennifer was horrified to find out that she and Marty had been married in the Chapel O' Love, rather than the big church wedding she had wanted. She was able to see and hear the two children whom she would be the mother of in 2015, Marlene and Marty Jr.. Worse, she saw Marty at 47, now a broken man who could no longer play a guitar due to the damaged hand he had sustained in the aforementioned car accident, who let himself be manipulated by Douglas J. Needles during a video telephone call into using his CusCo credit card in an illegal scam, and who finally ended up being fired via fax by his boss, Ito T. Fujitsu. Jennifer's final shock was when she used the thumb plate to open the front door; she found herself face-to-face with the 47-year-old woman that she would become, and, with the dual exclamation "Oh, my God! (young Jennifer) I'm old! / (older Jennifer) I'm young!", both fainted. Doc caught Jennifer before she could hit the ground, and Doc and Marty carried her to the car to take her back to 1985. Neither realized that Biff Tannen had used the DeLorean to change history. In the alternate 1985, Jennifer was left on the porch swing at her home where Marty noticed security bars on the windows which he didn't remember seeing before. Marty eventually had to come back in the restored timeline, wake her up, and convince her it was all a dream. After his adventures through time were over (via trips to 1955 to put history back on track and undo Biff's actions, and to 1885 to save Doc), Marty arrived at the Parker residence on October 27, 1985 to find Jennifer still sleeping. He woke her with a kiss and they went out in his truck. Jennifer told Marty about her 'dream', when a classmate, Needles, challenged Marty to a race. Jennifer realized that this would cause the accident that ruins Marty's life in the future, and urged him not to do it. At first she was shocked at Marty revving up the truck but was surprised when Marty purposely put the car in reverse and went backward. At the realization that Marty didn't hit the Rolls-Royce as he did in the alternate future, Jennifer pulled out a sheet of fax paper from the future with the message "YOU'RE FIRED!!!", just in time to see the words vanishing from existence right off the sheet — causing her to exclaim "It erased!", much to Marty's puzzlement. Jennifer was now in on the secret of the time machine, and was with Marty when Doc and his family arrived back from the Old West in their new train time machine. With the proof that they had prevented the events that could ruin their future, Doc told Jennifer and Marty to make their unwritten future a good one. ''Back to the Future: The Animated Series .]] Jennifer is a semi-regular in the Animated Series. Like Marty, she was now in college and often tutored other students if they are stuck. She never time traveled, although she was aware of the time machines' existence (she once saw the DeLorean disappear in the sky and calmly mused that Doc was not going to be letting Marty borrow the car that day, apparently establishing that she took the ending scene of the third movie as reality and not just another dream). Jennifer did not appear in every episode, but she played key parts in the episodes "Witchcraft" and "A Friend In Deed", where Marty goes back to 1875 to stop the Tannen family from getting the deed to her grandparents' ranch. The canonicity of the animated series as an extension of the films' storyline is unclear. Behind the scenes *Director Robert Zemeckis named the character in honor of famed injury attorney Larry H. Parker's daughter as Mr. Parker was instrumental in settling a copyright infringement suit in favor of Mr. Zemeckis. *The novel for Part I gives her grandmother's phone number as 243-8480. *The novel for Part II says that an identa-pad recited that her date of birth is "October 29, 1968" (page 53), but in the film, there is no mention of a birthdate and Officer Foley says that she is 47 years old. If one was to put her birth year as 1968, that would make her 46 on October 21, 2015 and she is clearly said to be 47 on that date. That would mean she was born in 1967. Or alternatively, it could be that Foley isn't too hot at mathematics. *A draft script said that Jennifer (known as "Suzy" in the draft) was seeing a psychiatrist, but no mention of this is ever made in the films or novels. *One might infer that she does not get along with her father, from the tone of her voice when she says, "It's my dad" to Marty in the first film, but she could have just been annoyed at her father being the second person (after the annoying Clock Tower Lady) to interrupt her kiss with Marty. *Claudia Wells, who played the role of Jennifer Parker in the first film, was replaced by Elisabeth Shue for Parts II and III when Wells's mother was diagnosed with cancer. *Though Claudia Wells was the original choice for Jennifer, she had been cast in an ABC television series and was unavailable when shooting started. Melora Hardin was cast as Jennifer, to play opposite Eric Stoltz, but before Hardin could even film a scene, Stoltz was let go. Because Hardin was several inches taller than Michael J. Fox, she was let go as well. **See also Replacement of Claudia Wells *Though not referred to in the films or the novelizations, Jennifer apparently was a cheerleader at Hill Valley High School. In ''Back to the Future Part II, when she is hiding in the closet in 2015, a maroon and white school jacket can be seen, with the name Jennifer and an emblem consisting of a megaphone over the HV letters. * In Back to the Future: The Animated Series, Jennifer's hair is blonde, reflecting Elizabeth Shue's appearance more than Claudia Wells's. Appearances *''Back to the Future'' *''Back to the Future novelization'' *''Back to the Future: The Story'' *''Back to the Future Part II'' *''Back to the Future Part II novelization'' *''Back to the Future Part III'' *''Back to the Future Part III novelization'' *''Back to the Future: The Animated Series'' *''Back to the Future: The Card Game'' **"A Family Vacation" **"Forward to the Past" **"Witchcraft" **"Solar Sailors" **"Mac the Black" **"A Friend In Deed" **"St. Louis Blues" *''Super Back to the Future Part II'' *''Back to the Future: The Game'' **''Back to the Future: The Game - Episode 1: It's About Time'' **''Back to the Future: The Game - Episode 2: Get Tannen!'' **''Back to the Future: The Game - Episode 3: Citizen Brown'' **''Back to the Future: The Game - Episode 4: Double Visions'' **''Back to the Future: The Game - Episode 5: OUTATIME'' *''Back to the Future: Untold Tales and Alternate Timelines'' **Issue 4: "Peer Pressure" *''Back to the Future: Continuum Conundrum'' **Issue 6: "Continuum Conundrum Part 1" **Issue 7: "Continuum Conundrum Part 2" **Issue 8: "Continuum Conundrum Part 3" **Issue 9: "Continuum Conundrum Part 4" **Issue 10: "Continuum Conundrum Part 5" **Issue 11: "Continuum Conundrum Part 6" * Back to the Future: Who Is Marty McFly? **Issue 12: "How Needles Got Here" **Issue 13: "Who Is Marty McFly? Part 1" **Issue 14: "Who Is Marty McFly? Part 2" **Issue 15: "Who Is Marty McFly? Part 3" * Back to the Future: Hard Time **Issue 19: "Hard Time Part 1" * Back to the Future: Citizen Brown **Issue 1: "It's About Time" **Issue 3: "Citizen Brown" **Issue 4: "Double Visions" ja:ジェニファー・パーカー pl:Jennifer Parker Parker, Jennifer Jane Category:Parker family Category:McFly family Category:Time Travelers Category:1985 Category:1986 Category:1986G Category:1990 Category:1991 Category:1992 Category:1993 Category:1994 Category:2015 Category:2016 Category:2017 Category:2018 Category:2019 Category:2020